Perfect Imitations
by The Shipping Cap'n
Summary: could be seen as a prelude to "I'm No Rose" or it's own angst ridden stand alone but hey its whatever


By Abby Hull

"Just kiss me already P."

"Amethyst! I-I don't like you being so forward, that's not how she is at _all_."

"Ugh, fine then, like _this_?" Large purple lips parted to clear their owner's throat. "Pearl, do you want to kiss me?"

Pearl smiled, shifting on the large lavender lap and offered a small happy nod. "Better, the voice still needs work though."

Amethyst pouted, a huff of "whatever" floating between them as deep violet curls bobbed in response. "Don't start, P."

This was common between the two, this shared secret of theirs. It had been since…. The _incident_ ….

[FLASHBACK]

It had been a stormy day at the temple, construction was going well enough on the new outer building. Garnet had taken it upon herself to shut off the open cave in a "home-style dwelling type structure they had seen in a realty magazine. Greg had bought the timber and tools, and soon after the once open mouth of the cave had been reshaped into the front of a home. It wasn't _nearly_ ready for Steven to live in though. This was no problem though, as the sweet baby was more than content spending his days gurgling happily with Greg's care in his van.

The rain pattered against the half patched roof and leaked through small holes in the still unfinished top, making small puddles on the cave floor below.

"Ugh, this will need to be sealed better, hm… and this, and _agh what is this?!_ "

Everyone was on high strings lately. Rose's "departure" affecting them in different ways. Garnet, the newly made leader, chose to go silent. Which wasn't saying much from her usual demeanor, but now she _never_ spoke, to _anyone_. Choosing instead to only seclude herself and work on the heavy duty parts of the home's construction. Amethyst had taken to hoarding more than usual, spending days in her room violently "reorganizing" her treasures over and over again.

Pearl however, had spent most of her days after Rose's "death" as she put it, drawing blueprints and making adjustments to the new home. She was never a believer in sleep, even then, but she hadn't even thought of resting in the days after Rose's sudden absence. Her hair was frazzled and sticking up in random spikes and her eyes had long since gone dull and almost lifeless as she ran on auto-pilot through the unfinished dwelling. Often times Garnet would listen through the thick door of the temple, keeping Amethyst back a few steps as she listened to the loud clanging of Pearl in her sleepless state as she worked herself into a frenzy. Their odd form of "watch-dog" usually only ending when they finally heard her stop, loud hysteric laughing or crying usually following and lasting the rest of the night.

It was one of those nights where Amethyst, oddly enough, volunteered to keep guard. Garnet finally slid her open palms off of the door, having been hunched in front of it listening tensely as Pearl once again was working on who knows what in the building beyond. She looked at Amethyst with a long hard gaze, before tiredly rubbing her hands under her visor, choosing to ignore Amethyst's shocked expression at the few tears that slid out beneath her palms in the process. Before anything could be said she simply pressed her finger to her tightly shut lips and walked away, presumably to have her own form of a breakdown in her own space.

Amethyst clutched her hands on top of her gem, taking a tentative step towards the door and pressed her ear to the cold barrier. On the other side things had gone quiet, the occasional sound of footfalls and clattering items sounding out only to go quiet again soon after. She stayed like this for a while until her eyes were drooping and she was slumping against the door more than leaning.

Suddenly a loud bang shocked her into standing. She pressed her ear harder against the door, stilling her frantic "heartbeat" and listening as hard as she could. Gems didn't need to breathe per se, but her chest felt like bursting as she held her breath listening for any movement. Then, a sound, quiet at first, but rising and getting shriller and more hysteric as the seconds passed sounded out. Amethyst's eyes widened as another bang startled her. She tried to separate all the sounds, tried to figure out what was happening from her position behind the door.

 _There's a bang, two thuds, then a tinkling sound and another thud, hysteric crying? Maybe laughter… then it just starts again… what is it?_

She found her answer soon enough, as suddenly she heard footsteps rapidly approaching the temple door. Amethyst panicked, running towards a large trash pile in her room and throwing herself into it. She dug herself deep into the sharp rubble and stilled just as the door opened. Pearl stumbled in, and Amethyst's eyes stared in shock at what she saw. Pearl's hair was beyond help as it gnarled in wild strands and spikes on top of her head. Her normally alert eyes were unfocused and dull, with a dangerous deep blue light almost emanating from them as they searched for something unseen in the cluttered mess. Normally Pearl would prance around Amethyst's room, gently reprimanding her for the growing mess as she attempted to straighten it. But _this_ Pearl didn't seem to even be on the same planet anymore, and walked uncaringly through a sticky puddle on the floor without even stopping. She continued to her waterfall, pressing a hand into the flowing water and started to rise to her room above. Amethyst almost wanted to _not_ follow, to let Pearl have her space. But there was something dark and small in the taller gem's other hand that had her curiosity peaked. She waited until Pearl had safely vanished into the waterfall's magic pull, and then quickly followed suit. As soon as she was up to Pearl's room she leapt to a higher pillar of water. Watching the scene below with a held breath and large, silent eyes.

Pearl had traveled to her main pillar in the room. She was simply standing in the center of it, staring into nothing. Amethyst tried making some splashing noises at one point, to try and alert Pearl to the world around her, but the knight was silent, never moving or even acknowledging the sounds. Amethyst was ready to pounce on Pearl, ready to try and rough house a response from her, _anything_ , when Pearl finally moved.

She could see Pearl's profile from above where she was crouched. And she watched intently as she raised the object eye level. Clutched in her open palms was a black, boxy object. Amethyst watched on from above as Pearl observed it coldly. Her eyes, though dull, focusing on the object as her finger skirted over it with practiced precision. Amethyst had never seen such an object but Pearl seemed to know her way around it well enough as she slid parts of it back and forth and loaded something into it.

Without any warning Pearl had the strange contraption aimed at her chest, right in the center, and pulled without hesitation a hooked part of it.

Amethyst screamed then, her cry for her friend unheard as Pearl's thin body was shot back harshly, glowing teal blood pouring from her open wound and gushing out around her as she laid splayed out on her waterfall. Amethyst's stomach lurched and she clutched a hand to her mouth watching numbly as the puddle get bigger and bigger around Pearl. The fluid from her wound mixing and trickling away sickly with the water from her pillar. She realized Pearl wasn't regenerating nearly as fast as she normally would, and almost threw up as she realized this was Pearl's _intention_. She had been shooting herself and laying there, repeatedly. Holding off her regeneration unnaturally to prolong the pain. Finally her gem forced regeneration, Pearl disappearing into nothing more but her gem, laying dejectedly in the cold flow of water and blood that still surrounded it. She watched as the regeneration process began, Pearl forcing herself out as soon as possible to only do it again. The eighth time she went to shoot herself Amethyst finally snapped. Her cries for Pearl to stop got no response, and even when she went down there and screamed in Pearl's face she still received no answer, no acknowledgement whatsoever. As Pearl's blood spattered out across Amethyst's face she broke, collapsing in front of Pearl's gem and smearing the blood away from the small orb, hysteric eyes not taking in her now blood soaked appearance. She stared, wide-eyed from her kneeled position as the gem floated away from her hold, Pearl's withered and rushed form appearing before her. She saw her stumble as she fell, already reaching with deaf ears and blind eyes to her terrified friend before her for the object Amethyst had learned was a gun.

She leapt to her feet, doing the only thing she could think of at this point.

 _I bet you'd stay for her._

Suffice it to say that Pearl had indeed been roused from her mind when Amethyst shapeshifted into Rose. In her hysteria she didn't notice that this Rose was purple, nor that she sounded different. Reality came in the form of her rubbing her hands over Rose's gem later on, noticing it was simply a flat hard purple disk and that the real gem, Amethyst's of course, was on her chest. She had rocketed away from her, wide eyes sparkling with tears and confusion as she screamed her dismay to the scared yet now taller gem.

"Pearl. I-"

 _Don't you_ _ **dare**_ _say my name with_ _ **that**_ _…. T-that…."_

The Rose imposter cupped Pearl's shaking face in her large hands, tilting her to look up at Amethyst's wide scared eyes. "Pearl." She tried again, "let me help you, let me do this for you."

[FLASHBACK END]

"The voice, Amethyst, it is _far_ softer, it _has_ _to_ _be_ _**softer**_ ," Pearl chided.

"Of course Pearl, whatever you want." Amethyst chimed instantly, almost scaring herself with how close she could sound to Rose now.

"Haaa, yes… Perfect." Pearl almost whimpered as she pressed herself harder into Amethyst and kissed her larger lips, an almost sickly sad smile etched on her face as she deepened the embrace. She either didn't notice, or ignored Amethyst's constantly open eyes, failed for whatever reason to see the tears falling down the purple gem's face silently as the kissing progressed. The unnoticed tears mixing with her own and being rushed away with the water of her pillar.

"Perfect."


End file.
